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Assassination Onslaught!
Assassination Onslaught! is the fourth episode of the first series of The Zany Adventures of Ho-Ip, written by The Boy Who Cried Godzilla . Synopsis When Bapho-Ip is discovered, The Order is furious and sends the assassins to eliminate the target, but not all goes as planned... Story Gro-Che squinted his eye in an attempt to adjust to the moonlight seeping through the rising bay door. The three moons being in their full phases made this an un-ideal night for hunting, but all the same, he did The Order’s bidding, just as he always had. His comrades Ko-Tok and Ta-Kon marched out drudgingly along beside him. They had been doing this for years, but, Gro-Che reasoned that no Ohpinian, Mutant or otherwise was meant to get up this early and be expected to perform their job at their fullest capacity. They all stepped into the dewey twilight, breathing in the dampness that the night had brought when it came. They had ample time until dawn, which meant ample operating hours for the grim task ahead, moons or no moons. They had all heard the news story. Not seen it, of course, they had never really been aware of video broadcasts in all their lives. They might even have been shocked to learn that pictures could move, but no-one was there to show them, and, they didn’t much care for things outside of their mission. Stopping to smell the flowers was for prey, and they were dedicated predators. The Grandmaster had not been happy to learn that his assassins had failed to adequately assess their little green target, and Ko-Tok still had some trouble walking after the punishment he had received. The three had come dangerously close to failure on some early missions, which the Grandmaster in his fury, managed to let slip an implication that some of their missions had been simulations. Gro-Che was hurt and confused by this, and he had little doubt that his colleagues felt the same, but doubt was a new feeling for him. And he was feeling it more and more these days. They were told that by the time of the near-failure at Skiznd’roue had been real. Well, not exactly told but it had been nothing like their earlier simulations. Unless they had somehow sneaked the headsets onto them while they were asleep… But then could this be a simulation? It stood to reason that he could no longer be sure of anything he experienced. Anything could be lies. Even the Grandmaster… Even The Order. Treasonous thoughts though they were, Gro-Che knew that they were necessary. Before all this nonsense with the little green thing the very notion that The Order was imperfect and deceptive would have been preposterous. Scandalous. Treasonous. But the more Gro-Che saw, the more he began to question, and the more he questioned, the clearer it became that he had no idea what The Order even was. The swimmers Ko-Tok and Ta-Kon opted to head to the mountain by sea, while Gro-Che was left to his usual means of transportation, hopping through the trees, wondering what the others were thinking, and simultaneously hoping and fearing that they thought the same as himself. Ko-Tok and Ta-Kon didn’t talk to each other. They seldom did, considering that they travelled mostly underwater, but all to themselves they too, began to wonder how The Order played into their lives, and what little they had seen of the world at large. The more Ko-Tok thought, the more he wondered what was outside of their limited sphere. Ta-Kon slowly stalked out of the water and saw Ko-Tok had made ground a little way downstream. The two made their way toward the rendez-vous with Gro-Che, and Ta-Kon took sickly notice of Ko-Tok’s limp. They met up with each other at the mouth of what was left of a long neglected mountain trail, which they would begin to climb once Gro-Che caught up. It was likely to be a minute or two. Almost immediately, Ta-Kon turned around to see the bird-ish boy standing behind him, a few dry leaves teetering down from his former perch. “You ready?” he asked. “Yes” replied Ta-Kon, not looking forward to the task ahead “Yes” answered Ko-Tok, not really meaning it. “Well… uh… I guess we move out then.” “What else could we do?”, sighed the round crocodile, turning to stalk up the trail. It was a decent hike to the top of the mountain, but it was still dark enough for them to operate effectively, though Ko-Tok and the others suspected that there wouldn’t be for long. As a punishment, the three had not been granted any weapons and were expected to use their phenotypes to execute the target. They each knew that this, in accordance with the perceived power of the green thing made them wonder to themselves if they could actually do it. Were they meant to? Or was this another test? A simulation? Was the green thing even real? Were his teammates real? Ta-Kon shook the thoughts from his head, rustling leaves to one side. The breakage of the silence made his fellows turn their beady eyes upon him, and in embarrassment he trudged on. In time, they reached the tip of the cloven peak. The oasis in the valley at the top was breathtaking. Moonlight reflected off the glassy lake, which reflected the fruit tree at its center, creating a a root system of shadow that reached down into another world that extended beneath their own. Glittering moonspores danced through the air like little jellyfish as they drifted along looking for spongy material to take root in, reflecting in the sheer surface of the lake as they did so, dotting the water’s image like shooting stars. Beauty was a relatively new suggestion for them, but the otherworldliness of the sunken peak, the fruit tree, and the floating stars caught in the air gave them pause. However, in their trance, they did not notice their quarry. “You have come to kill me.” It said. “We’ve been compromised. Shrunken Scissors. I’ll go high. There’s no way out now.”, whispered Gro-Che, preparing for a confrontation. “I disagree, brothers. Come and sit with me.” the silhouette on the edge of the lake spread its arms to indicate the ground around it with an almost eerie degree of deliberacy to its movements. Ko-Tok looked to Gro-Che for confirmation, but the young hawk didn’t need to say anything for them to know. “Hm. A pity. Although I expected no less. Your masters have done their job well.” And with that, the three assassins, with the tactical edge of unexpected attack shattered, fired forward in an attack triangle formation. Gro-Che launched high, while Ko-Tok winced his way through running in an attempt at the Shrunken Scissors maneuver. The new and dangerous Ho-Ip turned on them, his shining white eyes swirling as if filled with steam and emitting a mist as they cut through the night-time. A range of colors seemed to sweep the air around his form like the sun passing through a thousand crystals. The assassins hurled their tiny bodies at their prey. Gro-Che flung stones he had grabbed on the climb in an attempt to replace his toxic dart straps, but Ho-Ip seemed to catch them without reaching out to touch them. The more they threw themselves at the target, the more they began to realize that the target was returning no blows, and yet they were sorely outmatched. “I wonder. How might children such as yourselves have come to be a part of The Order? The Watchers?”, it asked without taking a step as the assassins swarmed. It was enough to make Ta-Kon think. They had only ever known The Order. They were mutants created by The Order. They were assassins for The Order. That was all their life was. Or was it? “You have seen, brothers, the most regrettable result of trying to build a mutant from nothing. Where then, did you come from? I see the hesitation in your movements. I see the doubts in your hearts. It has been some time since you have been simply tools of The Order. You are more. You will be more if you will allow it. We are Bound.” Ta-Kon was doing his best not to listen. His jaws flapped wildly at the goat-man, and seemed to be getting closer with every attack, though he more than suspected that it was just his imagination. “Have you never wondered from where came your names, Gro-Che, Ko-Tok, and Ta-Kon? Hardly befitting of tools. Hardly befitting of experiments” Ta-Kon was the first to break. “What are you trying to say?” “Come. Sit, and your story shall become your own.” “What story? W-We are The Order.” “And what is The Order?” Gro-Che and Ko-Tok had yielded their attacks, exhausted and bewildered, they began to listen. The colors swirling around the glowing eyes of the darkened form in the bluish glow of the moons, with the moonspores drifting amidst them brought them to peace. The colors were calling them all. Ho-Ip gently placed his hand on Ta-Kon’s cheek and he was filled with a despair that was almost palpable in the night air. “Oh, my child. There is much pain in your wake,” and the colors began to work their charm. The assassins felt as Ho-Ip felt. His colorful aura brought to them experiences and emotions they had never been taught to feel, and had never since thought about feeling. Their minds raced with the atrocities they had committed since the day they were born. Bred for battle and bathed in blood. They were children who had seen more death than the oldest adults, but in all that time they had never felt it. They saw the faces of targets long dead and for the first time they knew that they did not know. The colors took them deeper into themselves and the world. Gro-Che witnessed the sickening removal of his eye when he was a screaming infant, his feathers still slimy from the incubator tube, kicking and lurching as they tore it from its socket. Why? What had they planned for him? Ko-Tok could feel music. He saw it, he smelled it he could taste it. The tones the sounds the songs, they called him. He knew them, but had never heard them. He remembered them, but had never lived them. For the first time in his short time alive he felt that he knew he was living. The tones of woe and of infinite, swirling depth in a timeless dance around a star brought him to realize what it was that Ho-Ip meant when he said they were bound. Ta-Kon sat in silence. He did not understand. He could not understand. “What… what did you show me?” “The truth, my child.” “I am… we are stolen?” “Yes, child. An Imbalance beyond imbalances. Your genes were craved. Lusted for, after they saw what your brother could do” “M-my what?” Ta-Kon’s voice was beginning to catch. “We were taken from our homes? We have families?”, asked Gro-Che quietly. “None more than you see here, my child. When you were taken, they were killed.” “I… I don’t understand… Why would they kill people just to get... us?” “They wanted to have you.” “Y-you said I have a brother. Is he… is he still alive?”, asked Ta-Kon. “Unlike your brothers here, my child, your family yet lives, but that is no mercy as compared to what has become of them. Your brother was given and not taken. The truest of Faustian Bargains. But they found him too useful, and when they discovered you, you were stolen, and they left currency in your place...” ,Ho-Ip sounded distant, and stared into the moonlight. It seemed to Gro-Che that he might be living what he told them for the first time as well, or at least this aspect of it. “Is that why they started killing them? To save money?”, asked Ko-Tok, who was starting to exit his musical trance. “The Order is the money. It is of no object to them. They kill for the price of knowledge. Of Information, and of the risk it is shared. They exist for the power it brings. For the security in that power, which they take from the land, from the people, from the nature of being…” he trailed off. His monotonous voice was fluctuating. They thought perhaps he was losing control, and they too felt anger at The Order. Resentment for what they had done to them and were still doing to other people. Ho-Ip closed his eyes, and the colors stopped. They heard him breathe as he travelled deep within his mind in the damp serenity by the crystal lake. Finally he spoke once more, “Your parents live deep in the country. I can take you to them, if you feel it.” At this moment a single tear fell from the welling at the corner of crocodile’s eye. A metamorphosis is commonplace in an Ohpinian. It is a time in their life in which they begin to take on the traits of their unique adult form, however, due to the tampering in the assassins genes, and their being interwoven with the DNA of creatures living beyond the stars, none could be quite sure what would happen when the mutants reached this milestone, but they were all about to learn. His emotions grew stronger. Anger, confusion, and the deepest of sorrows made his body shudder in depths he had not known could be felt. As his tears fell, they watched Ta-Kon grow upward from the low and vaguely spherical form he had known for all of his few years. His legs stretched, skin broke and reformed as his shape elongated, and from his torso grew two new limbs He stood about as tall as Ho-Ip now, and stood on two sturdy hind legs. He knelt on the ground as his tears continued to fall. His reptilian body was covered in sporadic patches of feathers of a curious yellow cover. “Show me.” was all he said. Appearances Monsters *Bapho-Ip *Gro-Che *Ta-Kon *Ko-Tok Gallery Bapho-Ip.PNG|Bapho-Ip Gro-Che.png|Gro-Che Ta-Kon 2.png|Ta-Kon Ko-Tok.png|Ko-Tok Category:Fanfiction Category:The Boy Who Cried Godzilla's Stories Category:The Zany Adventures of Ho-Ip (series)